In recent years, online gaming has seen a dramatic increase in popularity. For example, in the year 2000, computer and video game sales in the U.S. were estimated at 6 billion dollars, with 219 million computer and video games sold and with a majority of the games including an online play capability. The popularity of online gaming will only increase in the future. However, as online gaming popularity increases, so do the number of players employing various types of cheats, hacks, and exploits.
Cheating in online games, defined as an attempt by a player to gain an unfair advantage over other players through exploitation of bugs in or manipulation or hacking of online gaming software, is a widespread and serious problem that negatively affects the level of entertainment and enjoyment legitimate or non-cheating players get from playing online games. Most online games use an architecture involving a game client program or software, including the client-side and display code, which is activated and interfaced by the player, and a game server program or software, which allows a number of clients to interact with each other in an online gaming environment.
There have been various programs or software developed to aid in the detection and identification of cheating players on individual game servers. However, such programs are easily bypassed, so that cheaters can continue cheating during online games. Therefore, there is a need for a method and system that can prevent cheating on online gaming computer systems, even for cheaters that try to circumvent cheat detection programs running on individual game servers.